Prot warriors doing a ton of damage. Prot paladins doing a ton of damage. (hello triple prot paladin team on page 1 of bg9 3v3).
Optimal rogue play was to come out of stealth and spam FOK.

PvE gear was optimal for almost every class. I said it earlier in this thread and I'll say it again. It's so fkn nice to not have to worry about pve gear this season. It's not even remotely close to S5, anyone who thinks otherwise is either blinded by nostalgia, fucking retarded, or didn't play s5.

It's slower than both cata and wotlk. Class balance for season #1 in an expansion is far better than any other expansion. The "do no damage but blow cds every two mins and kill" is the superior to bc's "do no damage wait till I get 3 mace stuns, or viper sting the shit out of his mana, or tab dot's till healer is oom after 40 mins, or get kill in the opener or reset". In retrospect, BC had a class balance that was wotlk level; but then again arenas were just implemented and it was something new and exciting. What people recall or refer to as "chess" (either because they don't remember or they haven't tasted it) was just linear gameplay with the same routine repeated every game. Of course it was superior to both wotlk and cata because it was new and fun.

Don't get me wrong, BC was my favorite expansion - I have the best and happiest memories from my time playing in BC. BUT, right now you have a Blizzard that makes swift changes, not a Kalgan that waited for an expansion to remove things like mace stun. Still, far from perfect but far superior to all the previous expansions combined. This is the first season 1 ever that more than 3 classes are truly viable. The power-resilience model is well thought and solidly implemented. One shotting exists, yes, but most of it is rectified next patch. Leveling is epic, PvE is flawless, the new areas as amazing, armor and weapons look good after quite some time; those are the hallmarks that so far only BC had. I can therefore safely deduct that this expansion will be far more enjoyable than the previous two, and, perhaps better than BC if they keep up with this pace.

justchecking, on 10 November 2014 - 11:58 PM, said:

Going to blizzcon looking for a fight is like going to the official wow arena forums for pvp advice :)

Renaissance_Man, on 31 July 2013 - 04:31 AM, said:

If I had a gun with two bullets and I was in a room with Hitler, bin Laden, and you, I would shoot you twice.

Disarmable bladestorm wasn't really something that people were ever demanding in the first place. Blizzard just kind of threw it in as a means to stop the high damage, but many warriors were actually quite upset with the change as their primary burst was completely worthless vs many teams. Unrelenting assault was stupid, but you have to realize that Wotlk was balanced around everything being extremely strong. Warriors were very good just like every other class. I don't really remember what the deal was with dispellable DP or divine plea. I'll give you prot/holy paladins, but they were only really a reigning 2's spec, so it wasn't that big of a deal. Death knights have always been EXTREMELY annoying, and that's not wotlk exclusive. If you mean first half of s6 and s5, then yeah that's sort of a testament to the difficulty of adding an entirely new class into a pvp environment. I believe I'm right in saying that monks are also unbalanced right now in the sense that they are lackluster. It takes time to effectively recognize the changes required for an entirely new class. About half way through wotlk, dks were reasonably balanced and good just like other classes. I'm too lazy to tackle everything else, but most of the rest of the stuff is s8 exlusive, which was full of dumb shit. Sure, destro lock damage and the fact that they completely countered casters was amazingly cheap. Elemental shamans were very good as well with select teams, but it's not like those were the only 2 viable things or as if it was even close to that situation. S8 had A LOT of viable comps and while the ladder had many druids and locks and shamans, it also had other classes that dominated as well. Vilerozes' MLD made LSD look like it was a mediocre comp ._. Every single class and even most specs in s8 had tons of BS about them, which aided in somewhat balancing the game. The best part about that part of the game was the fact that cataclysm homogenization had not yet occurred as well. You still had hybrids being hybrids and unique healers with unique niches. Discipline sucked at everything but was still in blizzcon grandfinals at the end of the day with amazing/unique healer burst. S8 was the peak for wow pvp until the end and regardless of how much some people hated it, it was generally revered for allowing success with almost any spec. Shadowmourne was legitimately stupid though. Blizzard's slow reactions toward fixing stuff in s8 was actually a blessing in disguise as we saw players strategically adapting instead of just QQing for months until a new patch hit. S8 began with infinite complaints about how ridiculous shadowpriests were. As s8 continued, people adapted and learned how to get around many shadowpriest tools. Everyone was playing mut for a while and was tired of getting globalled. Many of the smarter rogues transitioned to sublety to compensate for the metagame change. The lack of changes actually served as a setting for players to improve and adapt.

I kind of lost whatever point I was trying to make with this post but chea

Edited by ROKMODE, 27 November 2012 - 04:03 AM.

Expect bias in posts because
Wotlk is the best thing since sliced bread

Disarmable bladestorm wasn't really something that people were ever demanding in the first place. Blizzard just kind of threw it in as a means to stop the high damage, but many warriors were actually quite upset with the change as their primary burst was completely worthless vs many teams. Unrelenting assault was stupid, but you have to realize that Wotlk was balanced around everything being extremely strong. Warriors were very good just like every other class. I don't really remember what the deal was with dispellable DP or divine plea. I'll give you prot/holy paladins, but they were only really a reigning 2's spec, so it wasn't that big of a deal. Death knights have always been EXTREMELY annoying, and that's not wotlk exclusive. If you mean first half of s6 and s5, then yeah that's sort of a testament to the difficulty of adding an entirely new class into a pvp environment. I believe I'm right in saying that monks are also unbalanced right now in the sense that they are lackluster. It takes time to effectively recognize the changes required for an entirely new class. About half way through wotlk, dks were reasonably balanced and good just like other classes. I'm too lazy to tackle everything else, but most of the rest of the stuff is s8 exlusive, which was full of dumb shit. Sure, destro lock damage and the fact that they completely countered casters was amazingly cheap. Elemental shamans were very good as well with select teams, but it's not like those were the only 2 viable things or as if it was even close to that situation. S8 had A LOT of viable comps and while the ladder had many druids and locks and shamans, it also had other classes that dominated as well. Vilerozes' MLD made LSD look like it was a mediocre comp ._. Every single class and even most specs in s8 had tons of BS about them, which aided in somewhat balancing the game. The best part about that part of the game was the fact that cataclysm homogenization had not yet occurred as well. You still had hybrids being hybrids and unique healers with unique niches. Discipline sucked at everything but was still in blizzcon grandfinals at the end of the day with amazing/unique healer burst. S8 was the peak for wow pvp until the end and regardless of how much some people hated it, it was generally revered for allowing success with almost any spec. Shadowmourne was legitimately stupid though. Blizzard's slow reactions toward fixing stuff in s8 was actually a blessing in disguise as we saw players strategically adapting instead of just QQing for months until a new patch hit. S8 began with infinite complaints about how ridiculous shadowpriests were. As s8 continued, people adapted and learned how to get around many shadowpriest tools. Everyone was playing mut for a while and was tired of getting globalled. Many of the smarter rogues transitioned to sublety to compensate for the metagame change. The lack of changes actually served as a setting for players to improve and adapt.

I kind of lost whatever point I was trying to make with this post but chea

Wow a smart guy with no bias

justchecking, on 10 November 2014 - 11:58 PM, said:

Going to blizzcon looking for a fight is like going to the official wow arena forums for pvp advice :)

Renaissance_Man, on 31 July 2013 - 04:31 AM, said:

If I had a gun with two bullets and I was in a room with Hitler, bin Laden, and you, I would shoot you twice.

Disarmable bladestorm wasn't really something that people were ever demanding in the first place. Blizzard just kind of threw it in as a means to stop the high damage, but many warriors were actually quite upset with the change as their primary burst was completely worthless vs many teams. Unrelenting assault was stupid, but you have to realize that Wotlk was balanced around everything being extremely strong. Warriors were very good just like every other class. I don't really remember what the deal was with dispellable DP or divine plea. I'll give you prot/holy paladins, but they were only really a reigning 2's spec, so it wasn't that big of a deal. Death knights have always been EXTREMELY annoying, and that's not wotlk exclusive. If you mean first half of s6 and s5, then yeah that's sort of a testament to the difficulty of adding an entirely new class into a pvp environment. I believe I'm right in saying that monks are also unbalanced right now in the sense that they are lackluster. It takes time to effectively recognize the changes required for an entirely new class. About half way through wotlk, dks were reasonably balanced and good just like other classes. I'm too lazy to tackle everything else, but most of the rest of the stuff is s8 exlusive, which was full of dumb shit. Sure, destro lock damage and the fact that they completely countered casters was amazingly cheap. Elemental shamans were very good as well with select teams, but it's not like those were the only 2 viable things or as if it was even close to that situation. S8 had A LOT of viable comps and while the ladder had many druids and locks and shamans, it also had other classes that dominated as well. Vilerozes' MLD made LSD look like it was a mediocre comp ._. Every single class and even most specs in s8 had tons of BS about them, which aided in somewhat balancing the game. The best part about that part of the game was the fact that cataclysm homogenization had not yet occurred as well. You still had hybrids being hybrids and unique healers with unique niches. Discipline sucked at everything but was still in blizzcon grandfinals at the end of the day with amazing/unique healer burst. S8 was the peak for wow pvp until the end and regardless of how much some people hated it, it was generally revered for allowing success with almost any spec. Shadowmourne was legitimately stupid though. Blizzard's slow reactions toward fixing stuff in s8 was actually a blessing in disguise as we saw players strategically adapting instead of just QQing for months until a new patch hit. S8 began with infinite complaints about how ridiculous shadowpriests were. As s8 continued, people adapted and learned how to get around many shadowpriest tools. Everyone was playing mut for a while and was tired of getting globalled. Many of the smarter rogues transitioned to sublety to compensate for the metagame change. The lack of changes actually served as a setting for players to improve and adapt.

I kind of lost whatever point I was trying to make with this post but chea

Nice post, 99% of the people i see posting here should learn that, even if the game doesnt seem perfectly balanced to you try to overcome it and see what you can do, then you will realise that the game is more balanced that you think but that you just weren't good enough yet.

Im not saying that the state of the balance of the game is good now or was in s5, just that it is always possible to overcome with good, solid and strong play because all of the people you actually face and loose to aren't good enough to make it impossible(even top players/teams).

And even if its not possible its always better to think like that (by experience it is ALWAYS possible).

It's slower than both cata and wotlk. Class balance for season #1 in an expansion is far better than any other expansion. The "do no damage but blow cds every two mins and kill" is the superior to bc's "do no damage wait till I get 3 mace stuns, or viper sting the shit out of his mana, or tab dot's till healer is oom after 40 mins, or get kill in the opener or reset". In retrospect, BC had a class balance that was wotlk level; but then again arenas were just implemented and it was something new and exciting. What people recall or refer to as "chess" (either because they don't remember or they haven't tasted it) was just linear gameplay with the same routine repeated every game. Of course it was superior to both wotlk and cata because it was new and fun.

Don't get me wrong, BC was my favorite expansion - I have the best and happiest memories from my time playing in BC. BUT, right now you have a Blizzard that makes swift changes, not a Kalgan that waited for an expansion to remove things like mace stun. Still, far from perfect but far superior to all the previous expansions combined. This is the first season 1 ever that more than 3 classes are truly viable. The power-resilience model is well thought and solidly implemented. One shotting exists, yes, but most of it is rectified next patch. Leveling is epic, PvE is flawless, the new areas as amazing, armor and weapons look good after quite some time; those are the hallmarks that so far only BC had. I can therefore safely deduct that this expansion will be far more enjoyable than the previous two, and, perhaps better than BC if they keep up with this pace.

that's an interesting way to look at it. i don't entirely agree. the main aspect of TBC pvp that enjoyed was the fact that health bars didn't ping pong back and forth constantly during a game. you could pressure one target, then quickly swap back and forth to create pressure that way, which nowadays won't work simply because people get topped off too easily or they just self heal themselves up while not being the main target. it took just as much effort and consistent play to kill someone as it did to top someone off. of course, this meant for a slower game overall, but i dont think that was necessarily a bad thing. the bad part was that games tended to go on forever in certain comp matchups and the drain game became rampant, which admittedly was bad for the game. and i agree, the worst part of TBC was the massive RNG problems.

i guess in comparison to TBC, their slow reaction to obvious problems is "swift." i guess i just feel that with all their resources and given the fact that this is season 12, they'd be much more timely than before.

i completely disagree with leveling, but that's probably just because i've been playing this game for so long. to me, it was not epic. it is mundane and repetitive. I can't count how many times i was given a set of 3 quests which required me to 1) kill 10 things 2) gather 8 things 3) talk to 3 people. it was like that in every zone over and over again. again, most likely just my personal bias, not that leveling in this game has ever felt very epic.

Nice post, 99% of the people i see posting here should learn that, even if the game doesnt seem perfectly balanced to you try to overcome it and see what you can do, then you will realise that the game is more balanced that you think but that you just weren't good enough yet.

Im not saying that the state of the balance of the game is good now or was in s5, just that it is always possible to overcome with good, solid and strong play because all of the people you actually face and loose to aren't good enough to make it impossible(even top players/teams).

And even if its not possible its always better to think like that (by experience it is ALWAYS possible).

that's an interesting way to look at it. i don't entirely agree. the main aspect of TBC pvp that enjoyed was the fact that health bars didn't ping pong back and forth constantly during a game. you could pressure one target, then quickly swap back and forth to create pressure that way, which nowadays won't work simply because people get topped off too easily or they just self heal themselves up while not being the main target. it took just as much effort and consistent play to kill someone as it did to top someone off. of course, this meant for a slower game overall, but i dont think that was necessarily a bad thing. the bad part was that games tended to go on forever in certain comp matchups and the drain game became rampant, which admittedly was bad for the game. and i agree, the worst part of TBC was the massive RNG problems.

i guess in comparison to TBC, their slow reaction to obvious problems is "swift." i guess i just feel that with all their resources and given the fact that this is season 12, they'd be much more timely than before.

i completely disagree with leveling, but that's probably just because i've been playing this game for so long. to me, it was not epic. it is mundane and repetitive. I can't count how many times i was given a set of 3 quests which required me to 1) kill 10 things 2) gather 8 things 3) talk to 3 people. it was like that in every zone over and over again. again, most likely just my personal bias, not that leveling in this game has ever felt very epic.

can't speak on pve as i havent tried it and dont intend to

Just to give you a glimpse of how much I hated wotlk and cata and their leveling I stayed in Outland up to lvl 74 avoiding Northrend altogether. But when I reached Pandaria it was a totally different story - indeed the quest routine is the same (kill x, gather y etc) BUT with the major difference of the ambience and the storyline.

I have also been playing too long, and exactly because of that I have witnessed all the stages of the game and its evolution. It is my experience that makes me full-heartedly believe that this will be a great expansion. I lucidly remember the good times I had in BC but I now realize that I had a good time not because the game was balanced (it was far from balanced), but because I worked to get good looking gear and there were plenty of people to spam arena games 24/7, and therefore my thirst to play was always sated. I also remember that at that time I was 18 and not 24 which meant that I was more easily impressed and excited. I may lack the excitement I had at that stage of the game, but I now have the experience and "wisdom" to gauge the game's performance then and now, which leads me to believe that this expansion has the necessary ingredients to succeed where its predecessors failed.

PS: Just to remind you from a warrior perspective pressure in BC when you had 2 dps skills (whirlwind and ms) meant that you got two crits for 2-2.5k and 3-3.5k (full brutal gear and all bold crimson spinel gems) @15-16k hp pools. You had to wait for deathwish to do kill anything practically (or 25% enrage l0l)

justchecking, on 10 November 2014 - 11:58 PM, said:

Going to blizzcon looking for a fight is like going to the official wow arena forums for pvp advice :)

Renaissance_Man, on 31 July 2013 - 04:31 AM, said:

If I had a gun with two bullets and I was in a room with Hitler, bin Laden, and you, I would shoot you twice.

I just feel that the game is getting boring just cos every new exp blizz gives everyone a lot of new skills... So it makes hard to predict and understand what is going on.
As a druid for example i have like 6 kinds of survival cds. So its hard to predict when it's possible to kill me.
Not cos i'm good, just cos i have a lot of skills to protect myself.

Since everyone have a lot of skill, the gap between good players and average ones is getting smaller. And that is the wrong way to go.

Nice post, 99% of the people i see posting here should learn that, even if the game doesnt seem perfectly balanced to you try to overcome it and see what you can do, then you will realise that the game is more balanced that you think but that you just weren't good enough yet.

Im not saying that the state of the balance of the game is good now or was in s5, just that it is always possible to overcome with good, solid and strong play because all of the people you actually face and loose to aren't good enough to make it impossible(even top players/teams).

And even if its not possible its always better to think like that (by experience it is ALWAYS possible).

Very true. It's like when you get counter picked in League of legends, you shouldn't just give up. You can win by out playing them even if you are at a big disadvantage. I think if more people tried to overcome comps etc, instead of QQing on forums for buffs/nerfs then it would be a lot better for everyone.

@Braindance: the fact that this expansion is "closest to TBC" is actually a horrible thing. Imagine if we all got to play TBC now with how good people are at this game - it would be a disaster much worse than the one we are experiencing now.

Besides it seems you ignore a lot of the context. There was much less instant burst healing in TBC. There were much less abilities that hit for 70% of someones HP. There were much less instant crowd control, and also much less short stuns and lockouts and whatnot. There was barely any hybrid off healing. There were blue mana bars that weren't always blue.

For me personally, what I dislike about this game is pressure being almost irrelevant. I played affliction and unholy because I like trying to outpressure teams and create opportunities to land kills, they took that away.

I do agree though that outside of PvP, the game is great. This is the best PvE tier since Ulduar for sure, zones are awesome, itemization and gear progress is good, and there's shit to do when you're not raiding/pvping. Even dailies are alright once you get past the point where you have to do serpents, klaxxi and golden lotus on the same day (all the other factions are like 3-5 quests).

@Braindance: the fact that this expansion is "closest to TBC" is actually a horrible thing. Imagine if we all got to play TBC now with how good people are at this game - it would be a disaster much worse than the one we are experiencing now.

Besides it seems you ignore a lot of the context. There was much less instant burst healing in TBC. There were much less abilities that hit for 70% of someones HP. There were much less instant crowd control, and also much less short stuns and lockouts and whatnot. There was barely any hybrid off healing. There were blue mana bars that weren't always blue.

For me personally, what I dislike about this game is pressure being almost irrelevant. I played affliction and unholy because I like trying to outpressure teams and create opportunities to land kills, they took that away.

I do agree though that outside of PvP, the game is great. This is the best PvE tier since Ulduar for sure, zones are awesome, itemization and gear progress is good, and there's shit to do when you're not raiding/pvping. Even dailies are alright once you get past the point where you have to do serpents, klaxxi and golden lotus on the same day (all the other factions are like 3-5 quests).

I ignored no context - my main purpose was to provide a comparative assessment between wotlk, cata and mop. Even with its flaws mop is superior.

justchecking, on 10 November 2014 - 11:58 PM, said:

Going to blizzcon looking for a fight is like going to the official wow arena forums for pvp advice :)

Renaissance_Man, on 31 July 2013 - 04:31 AM, said:

If I had a gun with two bullets and I was in a room with Hitler, bin Laden, and you, I would shoot you twice.

I just feel that the game is getting boring just cos every new exp blizz gives everyone a lot of new skills... So it makes hard to predict and understand what is going on.As a druid for example i have like 6 kinds of survival cds. So its hard to predict when it's possible to kill me.
Not cos i'm good, just cos i have a lot of skills to protect myself.

Since everyone have a lot of skill, the gap between good players and average ones is getting smaller. And that is the wrong way to go.

Absolutely agree with that comment. There are too many strong Cds, on short cooldowns, that make it difficult to differentiate between good and bad play. Blizzard over-valued how much "skill" people took from using Cds, when the Cds are easy to execute or on short cooldown.

I'll give an example:

Anyone remember that tourney where the hunt/dk/hpal won? Everyone was fired about about the hpal's play, how he hung on to his bubble till last minute on Dalaran sewers and they beat a counter-comp by outplaying & positioning.

Rdruids now => Someone Looks at me, displacer beast. Next time they look at me or swap, barkskin. Even if I used these 2 abilities stupidly and they baited me to blow them for no reason, if they NOW switch on me I still have ironbark + symbiosis bullshit (iceblock) and don't worry displacer beast is coming right up.

It's slower than both cata and wotlk. Class balance for season #1 in an expansion is far better than any other expansion. The "do no damage but blow cds every two mins and kill" is the superior to bc's "do no damage wait till I get 3 mace stuns, or viper sting the shit out of his mana, or tab dot's till healer is oom after 40 mins, or get kill in the opener or reset". In retrospect, BC had a class balance that was wotlk level; but then again arenas were just implemented and it was something new and exciting. What people recall or refer to as "chess" (either because they don't remember or they haven't tasted it) was just linear gameplay with the same routine repeated every game. Of course it was superior to both wotlk and cata because it was new and fun.

There was a lot less class homogenization in TBC compared to wotlk and Cata. Blue bars existed. I remember enjoying playing war/lock/druid vs RMP b/c the strategy was simple, the war/lock/druid need to survive the CDs and mana bars from the RMP. It came down to execution because both comp knew what they had to do to win.

I feel like the number one problem with this game right now is that it is 100% comp based. Right now if you have equal players playing MLS vs an RMP. There is no hope for RMP. (I'm just using this as an example)

WoW has never felt so imbalanced as it does right now to the point where as soon as you get in the arena and see the other comp. You're thinking, god if i dont have a highlight reel game right now we have no chance to win because of how broken their comp is.

In wotlk and the early seasons of cata, most comps could compete with most comps if they were played extremely well.

It just feels like there's almost no way to outplay the imbalance of the game because of how imbalanced it is. Even In S5 with DKs and Pallies being god mode 2v2, there were still plenty of mage rogue or priest rogue team or warrior pally or w/e that could still manage to compete, and compete for rank 1 not just glad.

One of the BIGGEST problems in this game is the amount of "get out of jail free" abilities that certain classes have.

Disclaimer: I am not saying that classes dont need this, I am saying that all these things allow players to play worse and still win because they are able to not care about positioning as much / saving cds / preemptively guessing a swap.

Examples:
Dks: IBF while stunned and that random trinket thing that I dont even know what it is.
Hunters: two deterrence (you used to have to spec survival to get prep, so you didnt do as much dmg)
Mages: Jesus christ where to begin, Alter time, absolutely retarded, never needed in the game. Ice barrier on a 24 second cd absorbs 100k dmg, DF not on the global so you cant even dispel a nova, PRESENCE OF MIND? ROFL?(on crack when they thought all mages needed this). Cold snap heals you now. can be used while stunned silenced locked out, in your own iceblock. The amount of dmg mages do with only having to cast one spell. You can 100-0 anyone(other than godmode shaman) with dps trinket icy veins, frostbomb, DF, frostorb, lance lance lance, FFB.
Priests: Although disc is garbage compared to other healers atm due to survive and not being able to spam shaman god cds, they have psyfiend which is like a free fear w/o losing good positioning which is op as fuck. Shadow has disperse which you can use while locked out, completely lowers skill cap of class.
Shamans: Not even worth going into detail, this class as a whole has been unstoppable since season 9 and hopefully the totem change fucks them in the asshole. The sad part is, Shamans used to have the highest skill cap of any healer in BC and Wotlk.
Warlock: Blood fear is pretty dumb, oh also the fact that warlocks dont even cast anymore in arena. Hellfire radius and Rain of fire spam. Just overall skillcap being lowered so much that even the lowliest of retards can play this class competently. The Portal that everyone can jump through....cuz they needed that. Fear NEVER breaks on dmg. Thanks snutz.
Rogues: This expack kind of took everything away from rogues, but cata was fucking awful Rogues were so fucking easy to play, never died, cds out the ass to live and kite, and you could get away with having terrible positioning cuz of recoup. The vanish change obviously lowered the skillcap of rogues, but now since every class has like 7 abilties to break stealth in cata/mop it would have been near impossible to get a clean vanish like wotlk/bc.
Warriors: Rofl a retarded monkey could play this class to rank 1 pre 5.1. spell reflect requires no rage, no shield...Pummel and heroic throw silence...rofl...2 charges or a 3 second charge that doesnt dr with shockwave(=more stun duration that a rogue and can be done every 20 seconds) 1 minute aoe fear that rarely breaks on dmg (used to break if you coughed on the feared target, which is how it should be, its a CC, not a stun.) Second wind...troll. Obviously the amount of dmg is sickening. Intervene out of roots...no.
Pally: the amount of healing this class can do in 1 global w/o casting is downright retarded. Not too mention the amount of cc they can now put it, and it can rarely be avoided.

There was a lot less class homogenization in TBC compared to wotlk and Cata. Blue bars existed. I remember enjoying playing war/lock/druid vs RMP b/c the strategy was simple, the war/lock/druid need to survive the CDs and mana bars from the RMP. It came down to execution because both comp knew what they had to do to win.

Just to give you a glimpse of how much I hated wotlk and cata and their leveling I stayed in Outland up to lvl 74 avoiding Northrend altogether. But when I reached Pandaria it was a totally different story - indeed the quest routine is the same (kill x, gather y etc) BUT with the major difference of the ambience and the storyline.

I have also been playing too long, and exactly because of that I have witnessed all the stages of the game and its evolution. It is my experience that makes me full-heartedly believe that this will be a great expansion. I lucidly remember the good times I had in BC but I now realize that I had a good time not because the game was balanced (it was far from balanced), but because I worked to get good looking gear and there were plenty of people to spam arena games 24/7, and therefore my thirst to play was always sated. I also remember that at that time I was 18 and not 24 which meant that I was more easily impressed and excited. I may lack the excitement I had at that stage of the game, but I now have the experience and "wisdom" to gauge the game's performance then and now, which leads me to believe that this expansion has the necessary ingredients to succeed where its predecessors failed.

PS: Just to remind you from a warrior perspective pressure in BC when you had 2 dps skills (whirlwind and ms) meant that you got two crits for 2-2.5k and 3-3.5k (full brutal gear and all bold crimson spinel gems) @15-16k hp pools. You had to wait for deathwish to do kill anything practically (or 25% enrage l0l)

just gonna agree to disagree on the whole "feel" of this expansion vs the others. it's just a really subjective thing anyway.

in my opinion, if they were to bring more of a focus to the 2v2 bracket back into the game it would be much more fun on a consistent basis. much like skirmishes, the 2's bracket being fun allowed people to just log on and have fun almost all the time. now the focus has shifted to 3's, which can at times be difficult to have people all on at the same time for. gradually, even the focus on 3's is being shifted to RBGs at least from blizzard's perspective. "2's isnt balanced." of course it is not, and neither is 3's. it's just that the more people that are in the arena the less noticeable classes balance issues are and the easier they are to overcome.

IIRC health pools were around 10-12k. tho warriors could often reach higher. i played a rogue and warrior in TBC(warrior in s3/4). you didn't need deathwish to kill people, unless you wanted to kill them right out of the gates when both teams had full cds. at that time, however, the game was more about the opposing healer's mana OR reflecting a cyclone/shatter/poly etc. it wasn't the best system, having extremely long drink-fest games, but in my opinion it was much better than "pump dmg with cds or you cant kill anything" mentality that it is right now.